


But it will not bring disaster

by zelly



Category: His Dark Materials - Pullman
Genre: F/M, Future Fic, Post-Canon, Present Tense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-23
Updated: 2009-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-05 03:15:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/37219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zelly/pseuds/zelly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will's mother reflects upon her son one day after he brings her some big news.</p>
            </blockquote>





	But it will not bring disaster

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rynne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rynne/gifts).



> A big thank you goes out to my beta reader, Jackie.

There are so few moments when Elaine Parry can see and hear and feel clearly, when she remembers her little boy and how much she loves him.  
   
The young man who enters her room (_with its paisley print wallpaper like China teacups; white sheets; white curtains, white linoleum flooring_) looks familiar. He has a messy mop of dark brown hair and cautious but strong-willed eyes that are forever observing, and are (she is convinced) much deeper than the scariest, most bottomless well.

He smiles with slight crinkles when he sees her, murmurs his ‘_hello_’s and sits by her side, watching her with the attention of someone who knows so much more than he should. His suit is rumpled around the collar and is the colour of wet sand – an awful shade, really. She would have chosen differently. Dark blue, perhaps.

“Hullo, mum,” he says.

She stares at him, searching his features for a name, the name she’d given him when he was born. “You’re older,” she says in reply. Her voice sounds hoarse and strained and she isn’t sure why.

“Yes, mum,” he says slowly. “I’m twenty-six.”

“You were thirteen.” She remembers now. (But she daren’t allow herself to remember _more_ than that.) “Will.”

His expression brightens at that.

“I’m twenty-six now,” he reminds her – as if she would not remember the age of her son.

She scoffs, but it is entirely fond. “What are you doing here?”

“I’ve come to see you,” he says. “As I always do, every week. Remember?”

“Oh. Yes. Of course I remember,” she replies automatically – but she doesn’t. Not really.

Her fingers twitch as if prompting her, and she lifts a hand towards his face.

He waits.

The silence in the room makes her ears ring, and she can only manage to pat his cheek before she means to return her hand to her lap. Will catches it in his own, squeezing gently.

She feels exhausted.

He smiles kindly, the soft smile of a boy who won’t blame his mother for being unable to do her job. “Mum, I’m getting married,” he tells her quietly. “To a brilliant, wonderful girl.”

“You’re far too young for love,” his mother promptly says, and she feels it is the right thing to say because it’s something a mother should be saying to her child.

“Her name is Aurora,” he goes on. “She is a physicist like me. She studies in my field and she comes from America. I met her in Oxford, last Midsummer.” There is a sudden shadow that passes over his face, and Elaine is sure she is right in saying what she did, so she says it again.

“You’re far too young.”

But it isn’t that. He’s different. The shadow isn’t simply that of a boy with normal doubts. There is something else there. History, laden with tragedy and loss.

It is a past she was not a part of, and it makes her heart sad. She feels the weight of it begin to prick tears in her eyes until she whispers, “I’m so sorry, Will.”

Her son glances up at her with a frown that creases his forehead, thick straight eyebrows nearly meeting in the middle. He is confused.

“You have been through so much,” she explains. “Love gained, love lost.” She isn’t sure where the words are coming from, because all she knows is that she wants to bear his weight. He’s a boy, a young boy, and he should never look like that.

He shakes his head and smiles. “None of that, mum,” he assures her. “I’ve experienced none of that.”

But she knows he is lying for her sake, and the thought – while sweet – equally irritates her. She is his mother; it is in her genetic makeup to know things. (_And she does._)

“Things have happened,” he corrects himself, “but if they hadn’t, I would never have learned how to love someone else. Lyra … taught me how. And then I met Aurora.”

“Yes.” She nods, affirming her earlier suspicions. Love was gained and lost, but –  “Love gained again.” Her boy is strong, and she couldn’t be more proud of him for that. “I’d like to meet her.”

“I was hoping you’d say that.”

\---

  
When he leaves, Elaine watches him go. She makes note of the way he keeps himself guarded and tightly bound, careful (_always careful_) not to let his heart stray too far, but stray just enough to start anew.

She can already feel her knowledge of Will slipping away. It makes her swallow in panic and fear; she doesn’t want to forget. He was young and more guarded than he is now. He did _not_ know love, and he never had any friends. He was cautious but certain and he was fiercely independent (_like John_), but he was always alone. Then something changed.

She isn’t blind and she isn’t stupid; when he took her hand, she noted the missing fingers, and she saw the beautiful cat by the door.

She sighs.

“You were only thirteen.”


End file.
